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STANISLAS-JEAN DE BOUFFLERS (Lunéville,
1738 - Paris, 1815)
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Chevalier, then Marquess de Boufflers. He made his career
in the army, was also a poet, member of the
order of the Knights of Malta ; his father
was the Marquess de Boufflers, his mother
was Marie-Christine de Beauvau, a friend -if
not mistress- of the dispossessed King of
Poland, Stanislas Leczinski.
In 1785 he accepted to serve as Governor of
Senegal and the Island
of Goree, post offered to him by the Marquess
de Castries,Louis XVI's Secretary for the
Navy.
Wise administrator, the elegant Chevalier
is remembered for his lavish style of life
and love affairs with the Signares
of the Island
of Goree among whom the well-known Anne
Pepin, whose brother owned the present "Maison
des Esclaves". Despite those
love affairs, he was in a way a faithful man
and married Madame de Sabran in 1797.
When he left Goree
for France, not to ever come back, on December
29th 1787, the Signares are said to have gathered
some of the sand he had just trodden upon.
It is said he left 57 illegitimate children
there.
He was one of the deputies for the Nobility
in the States-General in Versailles in 1789
and was attracted by what were known at that
time as "New Ideas".
Back to France in 1800, after the Emigration,
he supervised an edition of his complete works.
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